I have my e280 v1 (Rockbox'd) and am CONSIDERING trying out some Ogg conversions of my MP3s. I may just stick to MP3 just something I am considering (or maybe for a 4G Sansa Clip if I get one for bike-riding and basketball).

My question is simple--what is a good kilobits setting for good quality without the files still being the same filesize as the original MP3.

I'm pretty much satisfied with 110 ABR (average bitrate) kbit/s also known as q3, you may go down to 96kbit/s without losing much quality. Try not to use a fixed bitrate setting. Also, use the AuToV mod for vorbis, as this is specialized on low-bitrate files (and thus giving better quality than the default vorbis codec).

NOTE: This only applies when converting from a lossless source, e.g. wav or flac. Transcoding from MP3 (which is already lossy) to another lossy codec like vorbis will most likely cause noticable drops in sound quality. I actually recommend sticking to MP3 unless the files are over 256kbit/s.

Thanks for the clarifications. Most of the songs I have are MP3s downloaded with (ahem) Napster back in the day, or songs I now download at Amazon or Rhapsody.

I have at times thought it would be great to have the original CD so I could create the type of audio files I like. I suppose that way I could rip them to WAV (or FLAC) then I could convert those files to (say) 160-192k MP3s for larger players, to 96k Ogg Vorbis for smaller clips like (say) the 4G Clip I have considered at times for basketball/bike-riding. Heck, I have the hard drive space for it (a 200G that has almost nothing else on it).